MUSEUM & CULTURE
American Victory Ship & Museum
Hillsborough County · Gulf Coast
A 1945 Victory cargo ship tied up in the Channel District, restored as a museum and still able to put to sea under her own power.
ABOUT THIS PLACE
California Shipbuilding in Los Angeles built her in 55 days and delivered her to the War Shipping Administration on May 24, 1945, one of more than 500 Victory ships turned out that year. She carried cargo in the last months of the Second World War, served in the Korean War between 1951 and 1954, including the grim job of bringing home the bodies of 370 American servicemen, and hauled equipment and ammunition to Vietnam from 1966 to 1969. Between wars she was chartered out or laid up in the reserve fleet. She was headed for the scrapyard when Captain John Timmel and Charles Harden picked her out in 1998. Congress approved the transfer that October and she was towed into Tampa Bay on September 16, 1999, through two hurricanes on the way. Volunteers put in close to 80,000 hours over four years of restoration. She went on the National Register of Historic Places on February 4, 2002, and sailed with passengers again in 2003. Visitors walk the cargo holds, engine room, crew and officer quarters, bridge and gun tubs. She is one of only three Victory ships left open to the public
Keep comparing